My Weekly Shopping List

Many people have requested more detail on what we actually buy week to week to fulfil our $75 a week grocery budget. Of course we get whatever we want or need – providing the amount spent doesn’t exceed our self imposed limit. I an earlier column I listed a typical week and was amused to see it was very similar to a food bank parcel which had been published in a story on the front page of the local paper that week.
Since then we have stopped buying tuna on ethical grounds and replaced that with chick peas in recipes. Also remember we spend almost all of our budget on food items as most of our cleaning and cosmetic needs are catered for with Baking soda and the few simple recipes I make (see above to purchase recipes pamphlets if interested…. it will be $10 well spent.)

In our cupboard we aim to have the following and we top this up with the $75 a week budget when necessary. Toilet paper (40 rolls $9-99 from the Warehouse). We don’t buy pads and tampons as we have purchased the re-useable and environmentally friendly Diva cup. Ditto nappies – be use re-usable environmentally friendly cloth nappies. Cans of creamed corn, cans of tomatoes, pasta, rice, flour, raw sugar, baking soda, white vinegar, butter, cheese, milk (is free a bonus of being a dairy farmer as is fresh meat), chicken, fresh seasonal fruit and veges, (also we try and grow veges ourselves and pick fruit off trees whenever we get a chance), spuds, eggs (we have chickens but they are pretty useless), cooking oil, seasonings, pulses (lentils and barleys etc), chickpeas, canned fruit (ie: peaches and or pineapple), bread ($1-65 a loaf)…..
This is about it…. we are buying meat at the moment as we have just moved farms and haven’t got a beast organised yet… that is a bit of a shock,but we are using smaller portions and filling up with rice or pasta with the sauce/ gravy, so it is mince and sausages all round. Yum.